On-Line Course Development in Remote Sensing at Virginia Tech Preparing Students for Careers in Remote Sensing August 2002 J.B. Campbell, R.H. Wynne, & L. Erskine

On-Line Remote Sensing Instruction at Virginia Tech 4 Jim Campbell, Geography 4 Randy Wynne, Forestry 4 Lewis Erskine, BSI 4 Supported by Virginia Tech’s Center for Innovation in Learning

On-Line Remote Sensing Instruction at Virginia Tech 4 Joint Geography & Forestry 4 Focus on learning activities 4 On-line delivery 4 Dual use: both contact and distance learning

Joint Geography & Forestry 4 Geography 4354: Introduction to Remote Sensing: An upper level undergraduate and lower-level graduate students. Students with interests in remote sensing, and in application areas. 4 Forestry 5000: Advanced Image Analysis: A graduate level class for students specializing in remote sensing

Joint Geography & Forestry 4 Develop consistency and continuity in the way that some topics are presented; 4 Consistent tools, approach, vocabulary; 4 Allow students to advance in understanding within a common learning environment;

Incentives for On-line Format 4 Broadens population of students, geographically both demographically 4 Permits accommodation of varied student learning styles; 4 Efficient use of instructional staff and computer laboratories; 4 Compliments other teaching approaches.

Development Process Understand instructional context Develop learning goals Select instructional strategies Develop prototypes Formative evaluation Assess each learning goal Summative evaluation

Stakeholder Needs 4 Course learning objectives should be matched to needs of stakeholders; 4 Difficult for instructors and institutions to develop this information; 4 Should be developed by professional societies, umbrella organizations, 4 Results should be stratified geographically, by size, etc, to enhance use

Overall Learning Model 4 Present basic concepts, knowledge & principals; 4 Guide student through an initial case study, structured to focus student learning on a few key facets of the process; 4 Present additional case studies, reducing structure offered to students; 4 Students then are prepared to conduct further Without strong guidance.

Focus on Learning Activities 4 Students learn basic principles and techniques in classroom lectures, text, or other on-line modules. 4 Develop on-line activities that apply classroom knowledge– lab, homework, case studies, or projects.

Dual Use 4 Contact use: In traditional classroom, or short courses-- reduce demands on computer classroom space, and instructional staff 4 Distance learning: serve students at remote locations

Course Architecture 4 Course designed to be used with a commercially available image processing system running on student computers; 4 Course software runs parallel to image processing system; designed to be as generic as possible; 4 Although the course guides students in execution of specific steps, it does not attempt to teach use of that system.

Evaluation & Feedback 4 Provide feedback to students, so they can focus on problem; 4 Provide feedback to instructors, so they can tailor instruction to problem topics; 4 For image classification case studies, our module includes reference data, so students see error matrices for their classifications.

It’s the Students, Stupid! 4 Define learning goals to match student and stakeholder needs; 4 Match contents and techniques to learning goals; 4 Avoid use of technology that does not clearly advance a learning goal; 4 Use technology to address weaknesses in conventional instruction

Instructional Design Staff 4 Brings knowledge of past experience; avoids mistakes that others have made; 4 Brings objective perspective; if its not clear to the instructional designer, its not clear for students; 4 Brings knowledge of other projects with similar issues;

Provide ability to navigate within tutorial & within course